Leith Stevens
Leith Stevens September 13, 1909 July 23, 1970 was an American music composer and conductor of radio and film scores.
The music accompanying the film The James Dean Story was composed and conducted by Leith Stevens. An eponymous album containing this music was released by Capitol Records in 1957, and its anonymous sleeve notes say, Here is the music direct from the soundtrack of The James Dean Story, a different kind of motion picture. This is a film in which there are no actors, there is no fiction. It is, instead, the story of a young man in search of himself a story of a lonely boy growing into a lonely manhood, of a quest for discovery and meaning, of a great talent and zest for creative expression, and of a tragic end which brought more questions than answers. The sleeve notes continue, The life of James Dean is presented on the screen through the means of a new technique dramatic exploration of a still photograph. Together with tape recordings, existing motion picture material, and the people with whom he lived and worked, these photographs create the presence of the living character. If there are supporting roles in this picture, the parts must be credited to the people of Fairmount, Indiana, where Dean lived as a boy to the nine million faces of New York City, where he struggled for recognition as an artist and as an individual and to the men and women of Hollywood who shared in the development of his career.The sleeve notes then go on to describe the music, The films music is as unusual and exciting as the motion picture itself. Leith Stevens, the composer, captures a haunting reflection of the violent yet strangely understandable uncertainties of modern youth. Stevens, whose musical scores have distinguished such films as The Wild One, Private Hell 36, Destination Moon and Julie, describes the loneliness and frustrations, the fury and tenderness of James Deans life and the world in which he moved. With his use of such instruments as the recorder, harmonica and bongo drums, and in his unique utilization of the jazz idiom, Leith Stevens produces music with dynamic person
Source: Wikipedia